OIL AS LOCOMOTIVE FUEL 111 



view, as well as from that of safety. It reduces expense for watchmen, 

 patrol, fuel cutting, fire-box cleaning and fire. And since it is an abso- 

 lute preventative while all other measures merely seek to miminize 

 the risk, it is probable that, even where the cost of the oil more than 

 balances these savings, it will save in the long run by averting a costly 

 fire. 



C. S. Chapman, Secretary and Manager, Oregon Forest Fire Associa- 

 tion. — My opinion would be that special patrols could be abolished 

 were oil used exclusively. However, we have had some cases where 

 railroads stated they would burn oil, and then, when pushed, ran out 

 a few coal burners and set fires. 



Oil is being quite extensively used in logging locomotives down 

 here with excellent results. How much chance there is of fire when 

 oil is poorly handled, I know little of, but I do know that our experience 

 with oil has been entirely satisfactory. 



H. R. MacMillan, Chief Forester, B.C. Forest Branch.— The 

 records of this office, while they show that a large number of fires are 

 reported as having been caused by the escape of sparks from locomotives, 

 or by the dumping of ash pans, cannot be used as entirely valid evidence 

 since, in most cases, the start of the fires was not observed and the cause 

 was merely conjectured. The only good evidence that I know of in 

 regard to the starting of fires, through the escape of sparks and the 

 dumping of ash pans, is the known fact that where railways run through 

 wheat or hay fields fires are frequently started, and I have myself seen, 

 from the end of a train, a number of fixes started from this cause. Furth- 

 er, on the Skagit branch of the Great Northern in the State of Washing- 

 ton, which is very carefully patrolled by a ranger, 157 fires were reported 

 in 19 10 and it is certain that not more than half a dozen of these fires 

 could have been due to any other cause. 



I would like to say, in connection with the use of coal, that it 

 seems to me utterly improbable that with the present investigations 

 by many of the railway companies, by mechanical engineering depart- 

 ments and many universities, and by locomotive works in regard to 

 safety devices for preventing the escape of fire from locomotives, that 

 some really effective device will not be discovered before long, and, 

 personally I believe that, considering the importance of the coal in- 

 dustry, we coidd well afford to allow several years for the development 

 of such a device before definitely advocating the abandonment of coal 

 and the adoption of oil for use in locomotives. 



R. E. Benedict, Chief of Operation, B. C. Forest Branch. — There 

 has never been any question that the use of oil as fuel on railway loco- 

 motives entirely eliminates the danger of fire escaping. Instances 



